Penn State picked to win Big Ten women's soccer crown

Penn State picked to win Big Ten women's soccer crown

Penn State has been chosen as the favorite to win the Big Ten Conference women’s soccer championship in 2017, according to the Big Ten preseason coaches’ poll announced Monday.

The Nittany Lions, who earned a share of their 18th Big Ten title in 19 years last season, were the top choice in the 2017 Big Ten preseason poll from the conference’s 14 head coaches. Northwestern, which claimed a piece of its first-ever Big Ten crown last season and advanced to the third round (Sweet Sixteen) of the NCAA Championship for the second time in program history, placed second in this year’s preseason poll, while 2015 NCAA Women’s College Cup semifinalist Rutgers, which has reached the Big Ten Tournament title game the past two seasons, was picked third.

Rounding out the top five in the team balloting were Michigan and Minnesota. The Gophers shared the 2016 Big Ten title with Penn State and Northwestern before winning the Big Ten Tournament for the second time in program history.

Also on Monday, the Big Ten unveiled its preseason honors list, as chosen by the conference coaches. Among the 42 students earning preseason honors are 12 returning All-Big Ten selections, along with four of last year’s Big Ten All-Freshman Team picks. In addition, more than half (25) of the students on the 2017 preseason honors list have received Academic All-Big Ten recognition during their careers.

This year’s Big Ten preseason honors list includes the Big Ten Goalkeeper of the Year for the past two seasons in Rutgers’ Casey Murphy (2015) and Northwestern’s Lauren Clem (2016), both of whom are on the 2017 MAC Hermann Trophy watch list, alongside another conference preseason honoree, Penn State’s Frannie Crouse. The past two Big Ten Freshman of the Year selections — Wisconsin’s Victoria Pickett (2015) and Rutgers’ Nicole Whitley (2016) — are also featured on the preseason honors list. Murphy and Pickett, who were All-Big Ten selections in 2015, sat out last season while competing for the United States and Canada, respectively, at the FIFA Under-20 Women’s World Cup in Papua New Guinea.

The 2017 Big Ten women’s soccer season gets underway the weekend of Aug. 18-20, with all 14 conference schools in action.